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Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 27 December 2010 - 07:54 PM

Kilorn, on 27 December 2010 - 07:44 PM, said:

, since you mentioned that you develop business applications, do you ever use matrices for anything?

Rarely. I find that most of my data structures usually fit in the category of Lists and Dictionaries. At worst, there are some trees, or maybe a linked list, though usually not implemented in that exact way (mostly just for data to be bound to a treeview-type control. I usually have no need for a matrix.

@Sergio

I know, it seems absolutely incomprehensible. But read the link in the original post. There are programmers who can barely write Hello World applications applying for jobs, and in mass numbers. I know from experience that some of these people actually get jobs!

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

, since you mentioned that you develop business applications, do you ever use matrices for anything?

Rarely. I find that most of my data structures usually fit in the category of Lists and Dictionaries. At worst, there are some trees, or maybe a linked list, though usually not implemented in that exact way (mostly just for data to be bound to a treeview-type control. I usually have no need for a matrix.

@Sergio

I know, it seems absolutely incomprehensible. But read the link in the original post. There are programmers who can barely write Hello World applications applying for jobs, and in mass numbers. I know from experience that some of these people actually get jobs!

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 03:42 AM

I agree with pretty much everything on this thread but don't have much to add.

"Hello, thread!"

except to say that this point has come up a few times since I've been around here and I never really noticed it before that. Now I notice that CVs coming in for positions at my work are glaringly obviously full of lies. People make mistakes, but when they say things that are just lines of buzzwords or things like "Proficient with the following languages: Java, C, Netbeans, PHP" it's a bit fo a red flag.
We actually employed someone once (well, I didn't) who chose to work from home and was actually - I shit you not - putting his work back out on rentacoder to get other people to do it because he didn't know the first thing about coding. And that's not the first occasion I've seen people's time wasted employing idiots or fakers only to sack them a couple of days later.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 05:23 AM

I don't have time to read everyone's replies so sorry if it has been said already.

While I completely agree that far too many people are saying they have no idea how to do their final project, don't know the languages etc... I cannot quite understand how you can be that close to completing a degree and not be able to write readable English. Almost all of them are impossible to understand, so perhaps I see a pattern:

Does not know language && Does not understand the concept && Cannot write English == From a country in which English is not a common language.

Therefore, I believe it is appropriate to mention that it may be that some countries do not have a well planned course for computer science nor lecturers that fully understand their subject.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 06:56 AM

My only question about citations are: are you really supposed to put 2 spaces after every period for MLA? I had professors say yes, and some say no. I'm getting mixed signals. My MLA handbook says nothing.

I guess I should actually put some context behind that thought. In high school, the teachers focus on stupid shit details like that, and not the big picture. My junior year of high school I had to write a paper, and 90% of the grade was whether or not you had your fucking works cited page right, but he never said that. At least half of my points were taken off because I didn't put 2 spaces.

In my high school, the professors either did stupid shit like this, or held your hand and walked you through everything. I understand that the kids need to know the fundamentals, but if you're going to call your class an "advanced" or "college prep" class, then don't hold the class up and make them 3 chapters behind because someone doesn't know how to activate the ser verb in Spanish in week 6. They just fail. No need to drag everyone else down.

Then they have the audacity to sit there and say "this class is going to be tough. We're going to prep you for college." when the only "prepping" they do is hand out college pamphlets and sit there and jack off/watch movies for half the year. Hell, I got to college ready to utilize my "college prep" and failed my whole first year. They almost kicked me out of college! Luckily, though, I brought it back up. >_>

I just think that the teacher think they're preparing the kids for college, but have been out of the game for so long that they've lost the feeling of hustle and bustle, how the profs teach, and the atmosphere.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 07:10 AM

My wife does the two spaces thing after every period she types, whether it's a paper at her college for a grade, or a forum post about how much she hates a particular feature of a game. I've never understood the actual point of having two spaces after the end of a sentence.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 07:35 AM

NeoTifa, on 28 December 2010 - 05:56 AM, said:

Hell, I got to college ready to utilize my "college prep" and failed my whole first year.

Don't forget though, that you're in engineering, where they expect you to not be a potato head. In other parts of the school hand holding and spoon feeding is still the normal practice, even at college level. I have a business minor and in most of those classes everything was just handed over. I had one economics class where the lecturer actually tried to make people think, and after a dismal round of results from a midsemester one girl in the class actually had the audacity to raise her hand and bitch that the professor "didn't tell us what would be in the exam." To which the professor replied, every single question in the exam could have been answered directly from the lecture notes she handed out every class.
I agree with you, people come from high school expecting to have their hands held all the way through college as well, and sadly a lot of lecturers give up the fight and just do it because it reflects badly on them if too many of their little lemmings fail.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 07:42 AM

That is another unfortunate situation that is contributing to the degradation of the education system. Too many teachers are worried about what their bosses will think when they see that too many students are failing their class, so they curve their grades so much that people who would normally have gotten a C or even as low as an F are allowed to pass the classes. I say remove grading curves and stop holding hands and make people work for what they get. It'll ensure that the only people who are allowed to graduate have actually done the work and earned the degree that they're getting.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 07:52 AM

That's easy to say, but my school already has a pathetic (something like) 41% completion rate. Stop holding hands and that would probably drop to single figures which would lead to less funding and eventually the school goes broke. Not saying it's how it should be, but it shows how it's not always clear what's the best path.

Re: Why are there people doing "final year projects" that don'

Posted 28 December 2010 - 07:54 AM

That is very true. I hadn't thought about that. It seems it's the perception of the school's completion rate somehow being the fault of the school, and in some situations it might be, that needs a change.